Pattie Boyd

This group was created in honor of the sixties model who attracted George Harrison like no other lover and had Clapton on his knees.

PATRICIA ANN BOYD, known worldwidely as Pattie Boyd, was born 17 March 1944. She is an English model and photographer, and the first wife of George Harrison of The Beatles, after whom she married Eric Clapton. She was the inspiration of love songs written by both musicians, most notably Harrison's "Something," and Clapton's "Layla", "Wonderful Tonight," and "Bell Bottom Blues."With her gap-toothed smile and baby face, Pattie Boyd was one of the most succesful models of the 1960s, and she was at the forefront of the Youthquake movement that would eventually transform the face of Britain forever. Photographed by the era's most iconic photographers, including David Bailey and Norman Parkinson, she was a household name by the time she graced the covers of Vogue and Queen in her early twenties.

" When I was younger, I loved wearing short skirts or low-slung trousers from Biba or Granny Takes a Trip. But I had a very fragile confidence. I had been a model, and I think modeling is an industry that highlights all your flaws and can magnify them all out of proportion. It emphasizes the wrong parts of a girl "

[Boyd modeling with Twiggy]

Boyd started her modelling career in 1962, but was rejected by many photographers owing to her unconventional looks including rather prominent front teeth; one stated, "models don't look like rabbits". She modelled in London, New York and Paris (for Mary Quant and others), and was photographed by David Bailey and Terence Donovan. Boyd was born in Taunton, Somerset, to Colin Ian Langdon Boyd and Diana Frances Drysdale (married 14 September 1942). She was the eldest child, before Colin (1946) Helen Mary (later known as Jenny, 1947, later married to Mick Fleetwood) and Paula (1951). Boyd nicknamed Helen "Jenny", after one of her favourite dolls. The Boyds moved to Nairobi, Kenya, from 1948 to 1953, after her father's discharge from the Royal Air Force following a severe injury as a pilot during WWII. Diana and Colin divorced in 1952, and Diana returned to England with her four children following her remarriage to Robert Gaymer-Jones in February 1953 in Tanganyika (now Tanzania). They had two sons named David J.B. (1954) and Robert, Jr. (1955), Pattie's half-brothers. Boyd attended convent boarding schools until 1961, and moved to London in 1962, first working at Elizabeth Arden's as a shampoo girl. A client who worked for a fashion magazine asked her if she had thought of a modelling as a career.

[Pattie with her sister Jenny Boyd]

" When I was 19, my agent sent me to a casting for (I thought) a commercial. When he told me I'd got a part as a schoolgirl fan in the Beatles` ''A Hard Day's Night" I panicked; I never wanted to be an actress. The Beatles were getting famous and I thought George was terribly handsome. I was more excited than nervous when I met them. I don't know whether it was by accident or design, but at lunchtime I sat next to George. He asked me to go out to dinner, but I declined as I was going out with a boyfriend, a photographer. I told a friend of mine, the model Pat Booth that George had asked me out and that I said no, and she asked if I was mad. As luck would have it, we were called back for a photoshoot for the film and George sarcastically asked how my boyfriend was. I said he wasn't around anymore. We went out to dinner that evening. That's how the romance started "

Boyd who was nineteen in 1964, met Harrison during the filming for A Hard Day's Night, after being cast as a schoolgirl fan for the film. Boyd was "semi-engaged", to boyfriend Eric Swayne whom she'd dated for about a year, and out of loyalty declined George Harrison's first invitation for a date, but said that Harrison was the most beautiful man she had ever seen. One of the first things Harrison said to her was "Will you marry me?" Boyd laughed, so Harrison said, "Well, if you won't marry me, will you have dinner with me tonight?" Several days later when Pattie was recalled for another day's work on the film, George asked her out again and she accepted, having ended the relationship with Swayne. Their first date was spent at the Garrick Club (a private gentlemen's club) in Covent Garden, in the company of The Beatles' manager, Brian Epstein. Boyd was present, along with Harrison, John and Cynthia Lennon, during their first encounter with LSD in early 1965. A dentist, John Riley, the son of a London Police officer, laced their coffee with the it. The effect differed among all of them, with Lennon and Harrison feeling ecstatic in the beginning, but Boyd and Cynthia feeling confused and scared. In an agitated state, Boyd threatened to break a store window until Harrison dragged her away.Harrison and Boyd were driving through London, in December 1965, when he proposed marriage to Boyd, but said he would have to talk to Epstein first; this was to make sure no Beatles' tours had been planned. Boyd married Harrison on 21 January 1966, in a ceremony in Epsom, Surrey, with Paul McCartney (Best Man) and Epstein in attendance. John Lennon and Ringo Starr had gone on holiday abroad with their wives distracting journalists from finding out about the wedding. Pattie started living with George at Kinfauns in 1965. Boyd and Harrison later went on holiday with Epstein, staying at the Hotel Cap Estrelle near Eze, in the south of France. While Lennon was in Spain filming How I Won the War in September 1966, Pattie and George flew to Bombay (now called Mumbai) as guests of sitar virtuoso Ravi Shankar, and returned to London on 23 October 1966. Through her interest in Eastern mysticism, and her membership in his Spiritual Regeneration Movement, she inspired The Beatles to meet the Indian mystic, Maharishi Maheshi Yogi, in London on 24 August 1967, which resulted in a visit to Bangor, in Wales, to join him again in the following day. Boyd attended the Our World broadcast of "All You Need Is Love", which was shown on 25 June 1967.Boyd was also arrested on 12 March 1969 for possession of marijuana, after a police raid.

" We shared so much and grew up spiritually together. And there are so many things that no-one else knows about what we did together; and there were so many things I still needed to ask him. After he died, I had recurring dreams in which he was still alive. You never know how long grief will last "

" I feel that George is with me forever, so I suppose I'd have to say that George is the love of my life "\" George and I were soulmates "

In the late 1960s, Clapton became a close friend of Harrison, writing and recording music together. It was reported at this time that Clapton fell in love with Boyd. Clapton also fell in love with Boyd's 17-year-old sister, Paula, who moved in with him. Paula left Clapton when she heard "Layla", because the song confirmed that Clapton had been using her as a substitute for her sister. Boyd claims that when she rebuffed Clapton's advances in late 1970, he descended into an addiction to heroin and self-imposed exile with Alice Ormsby-Gore for three years. Meanwhile, during Clapton's tenure in Derek and the Dominos, their only studio album, Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs, was written to state his love for Boyd. It produced "Layla" which became a hit in three different decades, and in two different versions. The outward image of the perfect couple masked struggles within their marriage, which began in 1979. Although Boyd drank, and admits to past drug use, unlike Clapton she never became an alcoholic or a drug addict. Boyd states that she left Clapton at one point due to his refusal to seek treatment for his alcoholism, and she began seeing a photographer, Will Christie. In 1984, Clapton began a year-long relationship with Yvonne Kelly; they had a daughter, Ruth, born in January 1985. Clapton and Kelly did not make any public announcement about the birth of their daughter, and Ruth was not revealed as his child until 1991, at the funeral of his son Conor. Boyd says that she did not know of the existence of Ruth until 1991: "What cut deepest was that Eric had known about the child all along. While declaring undying love to me and pleading with me to go back to him, he had been paying Yvonne maintenance for the past six years." Boyd states that she divorced Clapton after years of alcoholism as well as numerous affairs on his part, which began before their marriage. Clapton and Boyd divorced in 1989, following his affair with Italian model Lori Del Santo, who had given birth to a son, Conor, in August 1986. Boyd herself has never been able to conceive children, despite attempts at in vitro fertilization. Boyd and Clapton's divorce was granted on the grounds of `infidelity and unreasonable behaviour`.

" I still love `Layla`. I think it's masterful. It doesn't hurt, I'm beyond that. But I know it was for me...and I like that "\" It does give me a buzz, hearing one of the songs written for me...if it is playing in a cafe somewhere, I hear it before anyone else does. I think my favorite is `Something`, I love the flow of it "

Boyd claims that she was the inspiration for one of Harrison's Beatles songs, "Something," which Frank Sinatra said was, at the time, the best love song written in fifty years. Boyd stated that Harrison told her "Something" was written for her, but after they parted Harrison said he was thinking about a song for Ray Charles. Boyd also stated she was the inspiration for "Bell Bottom Blues," which Clapton reportedly wrote after he gave her a pair of blue jeans. In her autobiography, Boyd wrote that Clapton gave her a pair of jeans after returning from a trip to Miami. It appeared on the same album as "Layla," which took its name from a Persian tale of unrequited love that Clapton had received from a friend. On 7 September 1976, Clapton wrote the famous love song "Wonderful Tonight" for Boyd while waiting for her to get ready to attend Paul and Linda McCartney's annual Buddy Holly party. Of "Wonderful Tonight," Boyd would say: "For years it tore at me. To have inspired Eric, and George before him, to write such music was so flattering. 'Wonderful Tonight' was the most poignant reminder of all that was good in our relationship, and when things went wrong it was torture to hear it."[ source: wikipedia ]

I am just about finished reading Wonderful Tonight. All I can say is WOW!! Pattie led a pretty awesome life...all the traveling & thank God for her good friends since she was crushed by the 2 men who she loved so much. Rock on Pattie!